Category Archives: My Family

While other homeschool mommy’s children were making lapbooks and preparing Pilgrim plays (which we many time do) our day/week went a  little different.

This is how it looked on paper (well in my head).

Monday-Tuesday: Get all household chores finished.

Wednesday: Children work on ThanksGiving fun projects, I get things ready to have an  Essential Oils vendor’s booth at Support a Soldier Fundraiser on Friday and Saturday. If I wasn’t totally ready on Wed., it wasn’t going to happen, because I wasn’t going to stay up all night Thursday, nor stress out about it.

Thursday: Children watch Thanksgiving Day Parade while I begin cooking. Then they help out a bit, set up the tables and dishes and touch up floors and toilets, for a fairly stress-less day before our Family Dinner here with 21 people.

It almost came off without a hitch but ….

Mon. and Tues. went as planned. Wed. went as planned–pretty much. Children didn’t do fun projects–related to ThanksGiving, but rather built a fort and finished up their chores. I had everything ready to go for my EO showing.

Thur. began as planned, parade and me in the kitchen. Turkey on. Potatoes on. Whoops dd who put them on for me, after I peeled and she cut, may have thought I was watching them. I thought she would. They got a bit over boiled (falling apart.) Oh well, a bit soupier mashed potatoes than usual, but plenty of time in the crock to firm up a bit.

2nd turkey on. Yams in the oven. Onto Pies. Perfect crust–till I overcooked it during pre-bake. 2nd try–way to “gluten-y” (oh, I didn’t put full amount of butter in.) 3rd time’s the charm, right? (I hate that saying, but) Yes. 3rd try turned out perfect. Dinner rolls made into cute little bow-knots and raising. Pie crusts pre-baked and ready to fill.

“Mom! E’s wrist is broken!” What? No screams. No cries. What’s going on? Boys horsing around together. He fell back and landed wrong.

Yep. One look. No guessing. It is definitely broken. Take a moment checking on him. “Get ice on it. Check EO drawer for Helichrysum.” None. “Put a bit of Peppermint on it.”  Oldest daughter sits with and holds him.

” Take the yams out. Put the pies in. Then the rolls should be ready. Call your dad to meet me in Urgent Care.” And I run to get dressed and run a quick brush through my hair.

Urgent Care is closed. On to ER. His dad will figure it out.

He’s still not uttered a cry. Only a wince when we went over bumps in the road.

Get settled in an emergency room. IV started. (Only time he came close to crying.) Call from home. “Mom, when do we turn the turkey on?” “It’s been on since noon. Should be about done.” “No. It’s not on.” “Turn it on now! ”

Call to all our guests to fill them in on what’s happening and tell them to plan on dinner at 6-6:30 instead of 5. Hopefully we can be out of here by then. Or at least that’s the plan we’re shooting for.

X-rays (and still no dad there.) Yep. As ugly on the X-ray as the outside looks. Both bones broken through. One totally hanging out there. Nasty. ER doc says they’re calling in the orthopedic surgeon. So much for a simple set and send you home. Surgery scheduled for about 6.

Nasty break.

Waiting. Daughter heads home, and plan will continue as planned–without us there. Now praying he comes through it well and can go home instead of staying the night.

Many calls and texts to and from family as we just sit and wait and wait for surgeon to get there. E just lays quietly. Says he doesn’t hurt, but just tired. And not wanting to talk.

Anesthesiologist comes. Surgeon comes. E starting to get a bit nervous. First tears. He’s concerned he won’t be able to eat. (Right hand.) I assure him that I’ll feed him–and that he’ll probably learn to do lots of things with his left hand. His sister did. We talk about getting to eat turkey dinner after surgery. About sibs bringing it up to him if he doesn’t get to go home right away. About everyone coming to see him after dinner if he has to stay the night. He’s afraid he won’t be able to go to sleep fast enough for the surgery. I assure him that the medicine the anesth gives him will put him to sleep very quickly. He won’t have to go to sleep himself. And he won’t feel or remember anything while they work on him. He’ll wake up and have his cast on and his wrist will be straight again.

Back to surgery. More waiting. We play dots and boxes to pass the time.

Calls from home. Turkey still not done. Waiting on it and one family. No calls or texts for a while. More dots and boxes. More waiting. That 45 minutes lasted several hours.

Surgeon comes out. Went very well. They’ll come get us to go see him in recovery as soon as they wake him. We can take him home if he comes out of anesth OK. Surgeon leaves the hospital. More waiting.

And waiting. And waiting. The next half hour lasts several more. OR nurse comes out. He’s doing well. They’re waking him slowly, so he doesn’t freak out. She leaves the hospital. More waiting.

And waiting. Anesth comes out. He’s doing well. Not wanting to wake fully up, but doing fine. He leaves the hospital. More waiting.

Doctor comes in again. It’s now been twice as long for the waking up as for the whole put him to sleep, set  the bones and cast the arm. “He’s awake. They’ll come get you in a minute. You can take him home.”

Finally back to our boy. He’s up. Eating a bit. If he can get up and walk around a bit he can leave.

A little wobbly, but OK. No getting sick. I start to dress him. Oh yeah. They cut his shirt off. “That’s OK. He can wear the hospital jammie shirt.” Oh, yeah. You didn’t wear shoes and socks. “Here’s a pair of hospital ones he can have. Does he have a jacket?” No, it was really warm at 3 when we came.  “No. Let us wrap a warm blanket around him.” I’m thinking Cha-ching$ Along with the urinal that didn’t get used because after saying yes he had to go before surgery he decided he didn’t.

First smile since the fall.

Into the wheelchair, car, then headed home. Very pleased with the care we received, with all the staff. Thankful for quality emergency care.

Half our guests are still here. YEA!! Turkey wasn’t getting done, so they ate without it and gravy. Done now and turkey and full fixings dinner awaiting us–and more importantly, people we love.

The other children have pulled it off, and even cleared the table and ran a load of dishes. We are blessed. Thank you my loves! You’re the best!

A night in the recliner for me and E. Me waking every hour, moving his fingers and applying ice.

No EO booth today. Just oiling up my own little trooper. Dr. Mom steps in when emergency skill is complete. And back to another Day in the Life of….

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I’m still threatening to rename this blog “Never a Dull Moment”. Yesterday found us back in Urgent Care. This time with #2 son and a gash to his tongue. (Actually, I didn’t go. I’d seen it enough at home and I wasn’t relishing deja vu from when we took Eli in for the same thing a couple years ago.) Too bad we didn’t take #1 (at home) daughter in last week when she sliced part of her finger off. Then they’d have met every member of our family except youngest dd. :-/

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I will spare you the picture, but if you want to see it check my Facebook photos – in the mobile uploads album. He took the pic himself. (Not my FB friend? Request to friend me, just let me know you’re a reader of my blog.)

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That event made the rest of the week kind of pale in comparison. Well, except for the cause of the Urgent Care run – the 15-17″ of snow we got yesterday (and 1 other, noted below.) The boys shoveled our sidewalk and driveway, both parent’s, sister’s, and parent’s neighbor’s. They were pretty tired out. But sons were building a snow fort when the “mishap” happened.

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Do you see now why I just cook and take pics of food now – and do internet ministry? It is my peace in the midst of a storm. BTW, below is a pic of the Chicken Pizza I made last night. dd had put pheasant in the crock pot – but too late. #3 ds told me he wanted homemade pizza. I told him, “Tomorrow we will. Today we already have pheasant cooking.” Well …. pheasant didn’t get done, so I made the pizza. Was already planning to have a “meat” meal, and had cooked, shredded chicken in the freezer, so…

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The happy event of the week was dd’s 18th birthday! Wow! Time does really fly. She was the blessed babe I held in my arms on the 1 week anniversary of her sister’s death. A true comfort.

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What’s next? Hoping for a peaceful Reformation Day today, and to write my newsletter this weekend. Then Monday it’s time to put together the syllabi and make the shopping list for the

Freedom & Simplicity™ of Good for You-Naturally!™ Seminar LIVE

Health through Nutrition from a Biblical Perspective

If you aren’t registered yet, TODAY is the deadline!

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I probably always say this, but it’s been a busy week here. Here are 2 of the more memorable happenings this week.

On Mon. Mari tried to take off her finger with the food slicer.

Yesterday Jed lost his first tooth.

We just returned from a short family campout – no internet, no computer!, no housework. Amazing! Although all the mom work continues, just getting away is usually a vacation for me (unless it’s to work 18 hours a day on a book.)

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Relaxing! ? Well …

Some people’s idea of vacation is just going somewhere quiet and doing nothing. They don’t like to plan. They don’t like to do. Just relax. No events. No concerns. (Do they live in fictional world or what? But just to get off to a realistic start, ds got a concussion from falling off his skateboard shortly before we left, and we were still questioning whether we needed to go into urgent care to have his wrist x-rayed.)

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We went to a reservoir about 3 hours away, up in the sandhills, which are still beautifully green this year. The beach was beautiful – and we were the only ones on it. The water was great. Just a few fishing boats and tubers out. The campground was clean and uncrowded, just a few nice people to talk to. What more could we ask for? Peace. Calm. Perfect vacation.

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Our first evening ended with the traditional s’mores made over an open, wood fire. Well, it didn’t really end then. Shortly after we were all nestled snug in our beds and sound asleep, the wind came, then the rain, – and hail? I may be weird but I LOVE storms, especially when I’m sleeping with windows and doors open – as long as I’m staying dry and warm. I zipped the window up when the wind began to drive the rain in, and was enjoying the sounds and the smells.

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All was well until the wind ripped our door cover off and the rain started driving through the screen. It really was comical to watch trying to secure us again. The cover was not to be found that night in the dark, wind, and rain, and nothing was going to stick to the outside of the door – not that was wanted to work outside the door. Plan B. Use a different cover and secure it to the inside. Gorilla tape to the rescue. The praises of gorilla tape had been sung all week, as repairs were made with this super strong AND WATERPROOF tape. It was now being put to the test. It was a tough job against the wind and rain, but  it got done – with assistance from our oldest ds and dd, and only slight drenching, as was the camper floor.

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5 yo ds had just rolled over further from the door and the stream pouring in, and went back to sleep. That was kind of my opinion also. What’s a little water on a campout? As I said, a nice relaxing vacation – just not a fictional world one.

Look Mom, no training wheels!